Photo: David Shankbone, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Who She Is
Martha Stewart planned birthday parties for neighborhood children in grammar school. After a career as a stockbroker, she and her partner, Norma Collier, started a catering business in the mid-1970s out of her basement in Westport, Connecticut. Some of her clients were New York publishers, and connections she made at their parties led to a book deal. That book, Entertaining, came out in 1982. In 1990, she launched Martha Stewart Living magazine, and in 1993 she began hosting a television show of the same name.
Why She Matters
She also learned the business side by running the Market Basket, a gourmet food shop in Westport, and helping it succeed. Over time, she turned her catering start into a media company built around food, home, and entertaining, and in 2005 she wrote The Martha Rules, a guide to starting, building, and managing a business. She later taught home bakers on the TV series Martha Bakes. It all started in a basement, with a business partner and a few catered parties.
